The Cost

Bivouac après le combat du Bourget, 21 décembre 1870
Alphonse de Neuville (PD)

Alright, first things first - I'm not quite ready to climb back into the saddle (as in posting every day) just yet. Sloth is a bad habit to break, while I've not been completely idle, as far as writing goes, I have been completely idle. So it's going to take some time to break the not writing habit.

Another factor is that I am at a loss as to what to write about. War is my "thing" and I've told many a war-related story since the inception of this here blog. But I grow tired of it. War is a horrid thing, nothing to be celebrated and only to be engaged in as necessary.

People die, stuff gets destroyed, lives are changed forever and to what end? So some group of powerful assholes gets their say over something. Or they get to claim something which isn't theirs.

Sometimes war will start as one thing, then become something else. For instance, when, in 1789, the French dumped their king, and later executed him AND his queen, most European monarchies saw that as a very bad thing. Not because the Bourbons were necessarily wonderful rulers but hey, we don't want our own peasants and bourgeoisie getting the wrong ideas. As in, "Hey, we don't like how things are being done, so we're throwing you out and putting someone else in charge."

So they invaded France to put Louis back on the throne, and once he was dead, to put a different, though related, Louis, back on the throne. What all those European crowned heads didn't count on was the French people fighting back, en masse. Not with some uniformed properly trained professional army, but with common folks, semi-trained and armed, in large numbers.

In essence, in order to set back the clock, those royal armies seeking to do so would have to kill a lot of Frenchmen, and armies are expensive dontcha know. Keeping them fed and in the field for long periods of time drains treasuries. And a drained treasury is what the French Revolution was caused by (in part).

What was worse is that a very talented guy, Napoléon Bonaparte, took over the French armies in Italy, drove the Austrians out, then went back to France and essentially drove the French Revolutionary government out.

Now Napoléon was a big believer in a good offense is the best defense. Go to the enemy's home country and kick his ass there, rather than wait for him to come to your country. But one thing led to another and before you know it, the French were bleeding troops and cash in Spain and then Napoléon went into Russia and got his ass kicked by the Russian people and the Russian weather.

So it took a number of years to restore the Bourbons to the French throne. The French rather resented all that. Some years later, Napoléon's nephew made himself Emperor and went to war again. The cycle continued ...

Now as I read about the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, I read of destroyed villages, people uprooted from their homes and killed, if not as a direct effect of battle in their towns, then as a result of the disruption of everyday life.

I looked out my window one day after reading an account of a particularly nasty battle and imagined what my neighborhood would look like if a battle had been fought there. Well, for the most part it would be pretty much gone.

Buildings knocked down or in flames (or both), dead bodies everywhere. Not a pretty sight by any measure, and imagine the stench. Yes, dear readers, battlefields stink. Blood, voided bowels, the stench of expended explosives, the soil itself ripped and torn. Only an idiot would wish to see such a sight.

And there are people out there, people who have no clue as to what reality is, who clamor for just such a thing. Of course, they don't see themselves as actually having to participate. Someone else, the peasantry, the plebians, you know, the riffraff, will do the actual killing and dying. Not them, oh heavens no.

Those who desire war to seize property or to shove an ideology down someone's throat should be avoided. It would be nice to hand them a weapon and say, "You first." Though I don't see that happening anytime soon.

You can vote yourself into a socialist hell, but you can't really vote your way out. (Looking at you NYC.)

Think before you choose, remember, someone else might show up on your doorstep and shove a gun in your face to make you do something.

Anyhoo, war sucks and I tire of writing about it.

So yeah, I'm running out of stuff to write about.

We'll see how this goes ...

Ciao!

I Love Sports, I Loathe the Media

Source

Before we get to the rant portion of this post, Army got to sing first on Saturday.

Singing first means you lost the game. (For those who didn't know that.)

It was hard fought, though to be honest, I thought Army was going to walk away with this one. Navy scored first to make it 7 - 0. Then Army scored sixteen unanswered points to make it 16 - 7.

Navy eventually woke up and played like they had in the first quarter, pulling off a 17 - 16 win.

I missed the end of the game. Why?

While watching the game, the local news media interrupted the broadcast to announce that Brown University, in Providence, some 11 miles as the crow flies from Chez Sarge, was under lockdown/shelter in place for an active shooter.

Were there any announcements of what areas to avoid near Brown? Vague indications which only made sense to someone who actually lives in Providence. But to much of Rhode Island would be as meaningful as "places to avoid in downtown Tashkent."

The media in Providence thinks that Providence is the only inhabited place in Rhode Island. I stopped watching them years ago for precisely that reason.

For instance - I'm stuck in traffic trying to get off "The Island" (which is what the people in Newport County call Aquidneck Island, where I used to work), and am wondering "what the Hell is going on?" So I turn on the radio.

"Watch out for traffic near Thurbers Avenue as blah blah blah ..." Doesn't help me, I'm not in Providence, I'm in Portsmouth, why is our traffic backed up. Listen to Providence media, and you get the feeling that where you live doesn't exist.

Anyhoo ...

So they interrupt the game to bring us what is indeed important news. But of course, being talking heads, they have to blather on for fifteen minutes telling us that "it's an evolving situation, we'll update you as we hear the facts, blah blah blah ..."

Finally we get back to the game and I've missed some key plays. Of course, the local channel is running a banner across the bottom of the screen telling us that they still don't know shit but damn it, we're going to keep bombarding you with the information that we don't have, hope to get, and we'll keep you updated.

We don't loathe the media enough. It's run by idiots, the on air "personalities" don't know how to gather news, they just read stuff off of their laptops, stumbling over words at times.

So now another huge announcement, there's going to be a press conference. They have to come on live to tell us that. So officially we'll be briefed that no one knows f**king anything but now we'll get it from the governor and the chief of police. Ah, "experts."

Bottom line, once Navy kicked the extra point to go ahead of Army that was it. I missed the remainder of the game, the two teams singing, the whole atmosphere which makes the Army-Navy game so special.

No doubt we'll get to the point where they'll identify the shooter, name the victims, and call for more gun control, after all, this is a blue state. They think by making new laws you can prevent certain behaviors.

I mean I get it, my heart goes out to those who were killed, two as I write, and those who were injured, nine at last count. But come on media dopes, bring us news, not speculation, not who has responded. Tell us it's ongoing and where to avoid going. Anything other than that and you're being inefficient and annoying.

News is news, if there's an update, tell us. That there will be an update to the story is NOT EFFING NEWS. I mean isn't that effing obvious?

So I feel kinda bad ranting about this when people have died, but seriously, give us news we can use you media types, don't be on air just for the sake of being on air.

I don't hate the media, I loathe them.

/rant

Sarge, out.

Why?

A G.I. comforting a grieving infantryman in the Korean War.
(U.S. Army / Sergeant 1st Class Al Chang)

"What had been the point?" can be asked of far too many American military operations in the 20th and now the 21st centuries. We need to be more selective about when and where we risk our blood and treasure. Never as mercenaries, or to virtue signal, but only when our VITAL national interests are at stake. Never enter civil wars of other nations or cultures. Never defend national borders which have ebbed or flowed over the millennia. When necessary, kill people and break stuff as retribution or to establish domination, but never engage in nation building- leave that to the locals.... and let them pay to recover from their foolish actions which earned Uncle Sam's boot up their butt. - John Blackshoe

Coming on the heels of the Memorial Day weekend as it did, I thought that John's comment was excellent.

Once upon a time I read about Major General Smedley Butler, a two time recipient of the Medal of Honor. He made a speech (which became a book) about war being a racket. I used to disagree with his view.

Not so much anymore. I quote that book below, at length.

War is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few -- the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

And what is this bill?

This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.

Again they are choosing sides. France and Russia met and agreed to stand side by side. Italy and Austria hurried to make a similar agreement. Poland and Germany cast sheep's eyes at each other, forgetting for the nonce [one unique occasion], their dispute over the Polish Corridor.

The assassination of King Alexander of Jugoslavia [Yugoslavia] complicated matters. Jugoslavia and Hungary, long bitter enemies, were almost at each other's throats. Italy was ready to jump in. But France was waiting. So was Czechoslovakia. All of them are looking ahead to war. Not the people -- not those who fight and pay and die -- only those who foment wars and remain safely at home to profit.

There are 40,000,000 men under arms in the world today, and our statesmen and diplomats have the temerity to say that war is not in the making.

Hell's bells! Are these 40,000,000 men being trained to be dancers?

Not in Italy, to be sure. Premier Mussolini knows what they are being trained for. He, at least, is frank enough to speak out. Only the other day, Il Duce in "International Conciliation," the publication of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said:

"And above all, Fascism, the more it considers and observes the future and the development of humanity quite apart from political considerations of the moment, believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace. . . . War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the people who have the courage to meet it."

Undoubtedly Mussolini means exactly what he says. His well-trained army, his great fleet of planes, and even his navy are ready for war -- anxious for it, apparently. His recent stand at the side of Hungary in the latter's dispute with Jugoslavia showed that. And the hurried mobilization of his troops on the Austrian border after the assassination of Dollfuss showed it too. There are others in Europe too whose sabre rattling presages war, sooner or later.

Herr Hitler, with his rearming Germany and his constant demands for more and more arms, is an equal if not greater menace to peace. France only recently increased the term of military service for its youth from a year to eighteen months.

Yes, all over, nations are camping in their arms. The mad dogs of Europe are on the loose. In the Orient the maneuvering is more adroit. Back in 1904, when Russia and Japan fought, we kicked out our old friends the Russians and backed Japan. Then our very generous international bankers were financing Japan. Now the trend is to poison us against the Japanese. What does the "open door" policy to China mean to us? Our trade with China is about $90,000,000 a year. Or the Philippine Islands? We have spent about $600,000,000 in the Philippines in thirty-five years and we (our bankers and industrialists and speculators) have private investments there of less than $200,000,000.

Then, to save that China trade of about $90,000,000, or to protect these private investments of less than $200,000,000 in the Philippines, we would be all stirred up to hate Japan and go to war -- a war that might well cost us tens of billions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of lives of Americans, and many more hundreds of thousands of physically maimed and mentally unbalanced men.

Of course, for this loss, there would be a compensating profit -- fortunes would be made. Millions and billions of dollars would be piled up. By a few. Munitions makers. Bankers. Ship builders. Manufacturers. Meat packers. Speculators. They would fare well.

Yes, they are getting ready for another war. Why shouldn't they? It pays high dividends.

But what does it profit the men who are killed? What does it profit their mothers and sisters, their wives and their sweethearts? What does it profit their children?

What does it profit anyone except the very few to whom war means huge profits?

Yes, and what does it profit the nation?

Take our own case. Until 1898 we didn't own a bit of territory outside the mainland of North America. At that time our national debt was a little more than $1,000,000,000. Then we became "internationally minded." We forgot, or shunted aside, the advice of the Father of our country. We forgot George Washington's warning about "entangling alliances." We went to war. We acquired outside territory. At the end of the World War period, as a direct result of our fiddling in international affairs, our national debt had jumped to over $25,000,000,000. Our total favorable trade balance during the twenty-five-year period was about $24,000,000,000. Therefore, on a purely bookkeeping basis, we ran a little behind year for year, and that foreign trade might well have been ours without the wars.

It would have been far cheaper (not to say safer) for the average American who pays the bills to stay out of foreign entanglements. For a very few this racket, like bootlegging and other underworld rackets, brings fancy profits, but the cost of operations is always transferred to the people -- who do not profit.

- Major General Smedley Butler, USMC (Source)

There are things worth fighting for, politicians suck at determining what those things are.

I'll be back when I'm in a better mood.

Ciao.

Tired, I'm Tired Boss ...

PxHere

Long drive, Your Humble Scribe and The Missus Herself are exhausted.

Traffic through Baltimore and New Jersey was not bad at all.

Then we hit the GW bridge in New York - absolute suckage. Four lanes go down to two, why? Who knows? There are construction signs everywhere, roads are ripped up, barriers are in place but not a sign of, ya know, actual people working.

Want to know just how badly that city is run, just drive through it (actually just near it, the suckage is like a black hole).

But the Connecticut Highway Department makes NYC look like an efficient Swiss watch!

We're heading up I-95 and hit ten miles of bumper to bumper traffic. No signs to indicate what's going on, the GPS said there was a "lane closure ahead." No indication of where though.

Then we came upon it. One truck with a big flashing arrow pointing to the left is driving about two feet into the travel lane. About a half mile ahead is another similarly accoutered truck, this one is half in the travel lane and half on the shoulder.

Finally, there is a third truck, completely blocking the travel lane. In front of that truck is a street sweeper, cleaning the shoulder. Mind you, all of this equipment is traveling at about five to ten miles an hour.

Sarge, what's the big deal? They need to clean those shoulders dontcha know?

Yes, perhaps they should visit freaking New Jersey, where we saw three, yes three, street sweepers all on a similar mission. These all had one truck behind them (one!) with the flashing arrow thing. No traffic pretty much stopped for ten freaking miles, no sir. Things flowed.

Mind you, I've seen Connecticut shut down parts of I-95 so they could cut the one yard wide freaking grass strip in the center of the road adjacent to the concrete barriers dividing the highway. Yes, an entire section knocked down to one lane. Hey, here's an idea, pave that freaking strip. Save the state money that would.

Man, there are times when I think Rhode Island is poorly run then all I have to do is drive over to Connecticut to restore my faith in Rhode Island government.

Rant over, I'm going to bed.

It was a LONG day.

At a Loss ...

Source

Politics, I despise politics.

Everything in the news is politicized, or so it seems.

A horrible tragedy Wednesday night, a small commercial airliner collides with an Army helicopter, at night, both aircraft are destroyed. It appears that all the souls on board both aircraft are lost. Dead in the night in a fiery crash which ends in the cold waters of the Potomac.

Then the idiots (on both sides) start baying as to how this is some politician's fault.

Someone made a mistake, yes. But was it the air traffic controllers on the ground? Was it the people operating the two aircraft? I don't know, hopefully the NTSB will be able to determine that and at some point in the future institute some safeguard to prevent this particular scenario from happening again.

But you can't completely prevent mishaps. You just can't.

No matter how sophisticated the equipment, no matter how sophisticated the software controlling that equipment, and no matter how well-trained the aircrew, sometimes it just boils down to this ...

"Shit happens."

And when it does, people die, as in this case. Was this mishap preventable? Maybe, but as long as humans are in the equation things like this will occur.

People have lapses in judgement, people get distracted, people get tired, people miss  small details, there are a thousand things which can go wrong. That we don't have more accidents like this is something to think about.

Better equipment? Better software? Better procedures? Sure, those might help. Remember though, people put all that together. People.

Folks, we're the common denominator, there is no "they."

Pray for those who were lost. Pray for those families who will be in mourning. Pray for the sanity and the well-being of the first responders. Pray that it doesn't happen again.

But for God's sake leave politics out of it.

I cannot believe this crap.

/rant ...

12 October 1492

The Last of the Clan
Thomas Faed
Source

Uh Sarge, what does 12 October 1492 (the date Christopher Columbus landed in the Bahamas) have to do with a painting of Scottish Highlanders sometime after the lost battle of Culloden and the failure of the 1745 rebellion against King George II?

Well, your Old AF Sarge always gets a little wrapped around the axle around this time of year. Especially since a group of guilt-ridden white people in some places decided to change the name to Indigenous Peoples Day, or something to that effect.

Those folks in the painting? Yup, indigenous, to Scotland. If I still lived in Scotland, I'd be indigenous. But I don't, so I'm not.

White people guilt also got the name of where I lived changed, from Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, to just Rhode Island. Plantation, according to Merriam Webster, means ...

Source

Note the delicate wording in definition 3b, "resident labor." I suppose they mean "slaves" which is no longer politically correct to use or say, the preferred term now being "enslaved peoples." Kinda like calling a woman a "birthing person." Odd innit? Or maybe that's just me.

No doubt the same folks who were up in arms about the word "plantation" were also the ones who gave us the Washington Commanders and the Cleveland Guardians. I do know a couple of First Peoples type people who preferred the old names for those teams. (First Peoples is a Canadian thing, far more accurate really, what some call "indigenous" didn't actually evolve here, but they did get here first, so First Peoples makes sense on some levels.)

Don't get me started on the word "Indian." Yes, Columbus thought he'd found India, hence that word (indiano or indiana in Italian, indio or india in Spanish, not sure what it would be in Hebrew or Yiddish, if Columbus was actually Jewish. Just kidding, you can look that up, Google Translate has the word in both Hebrew and Yiddish, but I think it means Indian from the subcontinent, not from the New World. Google was not all that clear on that).

All that aside, I remember AIM, the American Indian Movement, native peoples up in arms over the screwing they received from the European settlers of these lands. Well okay, the descendants of the people who got screwed over by the ancestors of modern day settler/colonists.

So here's something to keep in mind, ever since Cain slew Abel, people have been f**king over other people. It seems to be something in our blood, in our DNA if you will. If we don't have something, and can take it easily from someone else, we do. The Americas were not a bunch of peaceful, nature-loving, groovy people just chilling before the Europeans arrived. No, they were like people everywhere, fighting wars, taking stuff from their neighbors and despising the "different from us." (That being one tribe hating another, like the Sioux versus the Crow, or the English against the French. That goes way back.)

Imagine what might happen if we make contact with an intelligent, space-faring species someday. They might wait until we're space-faring, or they might not. Who knows what (if anything) is going on "out there."

Maybe some species from another place is driving others off their worlds and onto other worlds. If they're technologically more advanced and are anything like us, be worried, they're going to take our shit, man, trust me.

Besides which, after the Bering Land Bridge people arrived, the Norsemen were next. Columbus was third, at best.

Why should he get a holiday at all?

Just curious.

As always, YMMV.

/rant

Author's Note: One of my nephews did some digging around in Ancestry.com, seemed to have discovered an "Indian Princess" in the family tree. I wrote about that here. I rather have my doubts about that "finding" as his research completely missed an actual person in the family tree, the one for whom my father was named. This fellow. So I won't be claiming any indigenous cred for this continent any time soon. I'll leave that to the Elizabeth Warrens of the world.

Thought for the Day ...

Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
(Source)

“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.”

― Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn , The Gulag Archipelago 1918–1956 (Source)

Think about it.

Also, go read this. We must not give away that which the Founders left for us and for which so many have fought, and died, over the decades which followed 1775.

Last rant for the week¹, new laptop is in the house, need to set it up and (ahem) check it out.

I will endeavor to write about something else on Thursday ...

Maybe.

¹ Maybe I'll do a thought for the day only on Leap Day. Yes, 'tis the 29th of February.

WTF, Over ...

(Source)

So Davis Monthan AFB is getting ready to replace it's A-10s with F-35s. Replacing a combat proven aircraft with one which, to my knowledge, has yet to prove itself to be anything other than an expensive Pentagon boondoggle. (See the source under the photo.)

We don't have enough ships in the Navy to stand up to a peer opponent.

We wasted how many billions on the Littoral "Combat" Ships?

The services are allowing retirees under 60 to return to the fold, though with nearly no benefit to doing so. (See juvat's post from yesterday.) (When will that become non-voluntary, I wonder?)

The services can't make their quotas for new accessions (officer and enlisted).

War rages in Ukraine and Gaza.

People are setting themselves on fire outside Israeli embassies in this country.

The world has gone insane and we have a doddering old man at the helm of the ship of state.

The former President who wants to replace him has had the Deep State trying to send him to prison since the day he took office. And is still trying.

What lies ahead for this nation?

I wish I knew.

But the current crop of "leaders" simply ain't cutting it.

YMMV.

Makes me sick it does. Makes me sick ...

What say you?

If It Starts to Feel Like Work ... (Part Deux)

(Source)

Okay, so I've been on vacation, had a great time, didn't watch any news, barely touched the internet at all. It was, in short, a fine break, away from the woes and worries of everyday life. Now it's back to work and ...

Work kinda sucks right now. New corporate policies are being promulgated to fix non-existent problems because, "that's the way these two other branches of the company do things," and they belong to the corporate structure which bought us out last year (or maybe it was the year before). I won't go into any detail but suffice to say, work is gradually becoming less fun. I am very glad that I won't be in the work force that much longer. As long as the joy of pay outweighs the pain of stupid policies I'll stick with it. But that balance leans more and more to the "no fun" side every day.

I am also exhausted after a long weekend of driving hither and yon.

Came back from Maryland on Friday, got up Saturday and drove to New Hampshire, got up Sunday and drove back to Rhode Island. Fun?

No, not really.

Traffic wasn't really as bad on the weekend, but on Friday it was a living, effing nightmare.

Waze was determined that I should plunge into the heart of the beast and take the George Washington Bridge (the GW) to cross the Hudson River. Hating the approach to said bridge (it's confusing and not very well laid out) and despising the Cross Bronx "Expressway¹" with nearly every fiber of my being, I opted to take the Garden State Parkway and cross the Hudson at the Tappan Zee.

Which worked out rather well, traffic on the Garden State Parkway can be, shall we say interesting, but nowhere near as interesting as the approaches to the GW. So I went with that.

Then I effed up. After crossing the river, Waze suggested taking the Hutchinson River Parkway/Merritt Parkway, which is very picturesque, has interesting overpasses and ...

(Source)

... is a complete pain in the ass to drive on if there is any other traffic at all.

And Friday last? Lots and lots of traffic, two hours to go forty miles, for those playing at home, that's 20 mph, which seems like one of those "well, at least we're moving" situations. But in reality it was more like, 2 mph for 15 minutes, then 40 mph for two minutes, rinse and repeat for two, yes, that's right folks, TWO (2) hours.

To be honest, the first time I ever took this route was in the early days of the late, unlamented, pandemic when everyone was staying at home. Hence, no traffic, so you had a scenic highway which was semi-fun to drive. While the posted speed limit is 55, most folks will do much more than that. Not that I would, law-abiding citizen that I am.²

The second time I went that way it was not as good, this time (which, unless someone dynamites I-95 will be the last) was awful, simply awful. The Missus Herself, upon hearing me say, "I'm never taking this road again!" protested, "But it's so pretty!"

I suggested she take lots of pictures to remember it by, because, nope, not gonna do it again.

Anyhoo, where was I? I didn't start to bitch about traffic but something else ...

Oh yeah, the title of the post, this blogging thing is starting to feel like work, distressingly so. (Why Part Deux? Well, I used the title before, here.)

First off, I think Blogger is messing with me, me personally. Damn thing is going back in time and marking one and two word comments as spam. Many of which (99%) were comments I made in response to someone else's comment. There were a couple from juvat and others which fell into the really short comment category.

Now my question is, who would think that a short comment would necessarily be spam? When something like "I now work from home and make fifty gazillion dollars a week, my mother-in-law's second cousin, twice removed, tipped me off to this amazing website where you can make billions just by following the simple instructions over there." Plus a link.

Now if I was programming a spam trap, the presence of a link would make me say "Whoa, wait a minute!" But a comment like "Yup." or ":)" gets sent to spam, a comment from up to ten years ago!!!

Also, a simple check that I have comment moderation turned on would indicate, "Hey, if it's less than five days old, maybe it's spam." But older than that? Not gonna get through the door unless I let it in.

I also have a sneaking suspicion that Blogger is playing with the views counter. They've done it before, where post views will drop down to less than 200 a day, then shoot up on some days to much higher than that.

So yes, blogging is starting to feel like work. Am I ready to quit?

Not yet, but we're getting close.

Regular blogging may (or may not, I dunno) continue on the morrow.

It's getting to be a chore!

/rant

1 It is anything but "express" on most days. Hence the quote marks.

² No, really. Well, maybe a little over 55, but nowhere near 75, or 80, I promise.

Waiting ...

(Source)

I remember in college, when The Missus Herself and I, along with the progeny, would head up to Cheyenne, usually to hit the Exchange and the Commissary. There were occasions where we'd not be finished there until sunset.

In those days I-25 between Cheyenne and Fort Collins was still pretty clear of civilization. Saw pronghorns and the occasional helicopter servicing a missile silo out there on the prairie, but it was pretty empty. (A glance at the map says it's still pretty empty.)

Anyhoo, on the drive home we'd often see lightning, way out on the prairie. Flashing lights out on the eastern horizon, I can't imagine what it must have been like back in the day for the inhabitants. For us, we were in the steel cocoon of my Volkswagen Jetta, headed home to the safety and warmth of our apartment.

Sometimes those storms would track in and run along the Front Range. We could get some pretty heavy rain and some spectacular thunder-boomers out of that. But we were safe from the storm, we were together, all we had to do was wait for the storm to pass.

Things in Omaha were a little more interesting, we had no mountains to our rear, we were out there on the plains. Sure it was built up and very civilized looking. Mother Nature didn't care, her storms would sweep in and rattle everyone's nerves. We were lucky, the closest we ever got to a tornado was about a mile.

I had no problems with missing out on that.

Again though, we were together as we waited out the storm. Knowing that one way or another, it would pass.

What we're facing in this country right now is a mess. A storm of idiocy and bad decisions I can say I've ever seen before. (From what I remember of the Cuban Missile Crisis, that was close to being the worst I've seen in this country.)

War in Ukraine, war against the middle class, when and where is this nonsense going to end? The so-called "experts" have never been right about anything that I can see. They're all just a new wannabe nobility who just want more power and more money. Not sure how long it's going to take for this storm to pass.

I just hope we can stick together through all this, much as my family and I have done over the years, supporting each other, loving each other, and trusting that all would be well.

God, I surely hope this passes soon.

My ability to wait is not what it used to be.

FUBAR¹

Les dernières cartouches²
Alphonse-Marie-Adolphe de Neuville, 1873

I like this painting. I stumbled across it while researching the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871. It's not meant to be allegorical, it depicts an actual incident during the opening stages of the war. But after looking at it for a while, it kind of feels like it depicts what my view of the world is right now.

On the left of the painting is the world going effing mad. The chap just behind the shooters, leaning on the cabinet with the bandaged leg, seems interested in the goings on, but detached from them. He's watching the news, believes what he's seeing, but has no plan or desire to get involved or change anything.

The guy on the floor has given up, he can't believe the crap he's seeing, feels powerless to change anything, so he's just given up. That guy behind him, he's pissed off, he knows he can't change a damned thing, but he tried, and got burned for it.

That officer-looking fellow in the back room? Thinks he's doing his job, but the job he's doing makes no sense to anyone but him. He's contributing nothing, but damn he looks good doing it.

The guy leaning against the wall on the right? He's pissed off, he's detached, and has zero effs left to give.

Kinda like me.

Kid should get a blog.

¹ The current state of affairs in these here United States.

² The last cartridges. French snipers ambush Bavarian troops, hiding in the l'Auberge Bourgerie in Bazeilles, prior to the Battle of Sedan during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870.

Rules, Laws, Regulations ...

Page one of the officially engrossed copy of the Constitution signed by delegates.
A print run of 500 copies of the final version preceded this copy. (Source)

If you live by yourself, out at the back of beyond, you don't really need any laws or rules governing your conduct. Other than the laws of nature that is ...

• Don't leave food out which attracts wild life, especially the sort which would just as soon eat you and the food you left out.
• Dress for the conditions in your area.
• Don't leave fires unattended.
• Don't go out in weather that can kill you, unless you're prepared for it.

Yes, there are others, lots of them. But I have to assume that if you're reading this, then you don't live out at the back of beyond. You'd be too busy to waste time on the Internet.

People of common sense and good will need very few rules to keep them from each other's throats. Because in many cases, that's what all the rules are for - guy cuts you off in traffic, though you might want to, you ain't gonna kill him. If the cops are around, they'll explain the rules to him. But if he had any common sense, and wasn't a jerk, he wouldn't have cut you off anyway.

Most people don't need a lot of rules, but those whose task it is to represent us (which is how we citizens see it, not sure how the subjects view it) seem to think every problem can be solved by making more rules, more laws.

Yes, because that works so well ...

Theft is against the law, yet people still rob ...

Murder is against the law, yet people still murder ...

Making more laws doesn't solve anything, enforcing the ones that are on the books just might.

Some years back (twenty to be exact) there was a big fire in a local nightclub¹, lots of people died. The laws which were on the books might have prevented that, common sense would definitely have prevented that.

Turns out that a lot of rules and laws were broken, but those whose job it was to make sure the rules were followed (stupid people need to constantly be reminded of what the rules are) didn't do so. So what did the politicians do?

Made more rules.

"No smoking within 50 feet of an entryway into a building ..."

Yes, precisely the sort of thing which would stop people from installing highly flammable sound proofing inside a club, then setting off pyrotechnics inside that club. What could possibly go wrong?

Ask the families of the hundred who died.

Common sense, not doing stupid things, sad to say, but most people can't handle that. Ever go shopping?

(Source)

If you can't put your shopping cart away, what other common courtesies do you ignore?

• Treat a stop sign like a yield sign?
• Don't stop for pedestrians in a cross walk?
• Weave in and out of traffic like some maniacal clown?
• Speed up when the light turns yellow?
• Don't dim your high beams for oncoming traffic?
• Don't use your turn signals?

Yup, those are all rules, many of which people ignore or, to be charitable, are ignorant off. Breaking them doesn't make you an axe murderer, but it just might make you an asshole.

Be considerate of others, hell, it hardly takes any effort at all.

Rant complete.

¹ The Station nightclub fire in February of 2003.

Ukraine - The View from Poland, November Update, Addendum

(Source)

Editor's Note: This snippet was sent to me by our Polish correspondent, Paweł Kasperek. His thoughts and opinions on the matter do not necessarily match my own. I'll have some thoughts (read rant) after the following clips.

Ewok Report episode ? and a half.

A small update to latest Ewok report, just enhancing on some topics I mentioned too briefly for my own taste.

Poland shopping spree in depth and detail: what, where, why, and how ...

Polish Military Modernization

Russian military rebelling prospects:

What if the Russian Military Rebels Against the Kremlin?

Some analogies to WW1 are in place, but it definitely lacks the crucial component, an organized and able opposition inside Russia itself ...

EDITOR: To say that the situation in Ukraine is complex might be an understatement. But nearly every event in history where one group has used military force against another has been complex. Anything to do with Russia and the pieces of its former empire is even more complex. At least by my reckoning.

An interesting (and seems to me very pro-Ukrainian) Wikipedia article which summarizes what led us to this point in time is here. If you want a Russian point of view, head to rt.com, if you can stomach outright propaganda that is.

Ukrainian propaganda is more palatable, at least the instances I follow (see Operator Starsky on YouTube and this report.) Russian propaganda has never really been for external consumption, it's meant solely for the Russian people. A captive audience in many ways.

The latest I'm hearing vis-à-vis Ukraine is that the Russians wish to de-Nazify Ukraine. While there have been incidents of Ukrainians wearing WWII Nazi symbols (if you know where to look you can buy them yourself online) it's not unusual. (Look up our own Marines posing with an "SS Flag" in Afghanistan.) This article addresses that Nazi aspect. (Hey, it's a thing right, claim the other side are Nazis!)

Let's face it, Russians are suspicious of the outside world (get invaded numerous times over the centuries and you might sympathize). Pushing NATO closer and closer to the Russian border may have triggered this reaction on Putin's part. Then again, the plebiscites and the pro-Russian sentiment in Donbas and Luhansk remind me of the Hitlerian agitation over the Sudetenland in 1938.

Sometimes people just start reacting and things gain a life and momentum of their own. I'm sure Putin's generals told him what he wanted to hear, they probably believed themselves what they were telling him. "Invade Ukraine? No problem, we'll be in Kiev in a couple of days, a week at the outside."

Do you think our current crop of generals don't tell our current crop of politicians the same thing? What the politicos want to hear is almost never synonymous with the truth. And those politicians are usually too ignorant to know better.

Miscommunications, lies, half-truths, and outright bullshit, none of these things are a sound basis for international relations.

Too bad that it's all most politicians know.

/rant